Properties Class


Properties Class

The properties object contains key and value pair both as a string. The java.util.Properties class is the subclass of Hashtable.

It can be used to get property value based on the property key. The Properties class provides methods to get data from properties file and store data into properties file. Moreover, it can be used to get properties of system.

Advantage of properties file

Recompilation is not required, if information is changed from properties file: If any information is changed from


Loading properties

To load a properties file bundled with your application:

public class CustomPropertiesLoader {
    public static Properties loadCustomProperties() {
        try (InputStream resourceStream =
                CustomPropertiesLoader.class.getResourceAsStream("custom.properties")) {
            Properties customProperties = new Properties();
            customProperties.load(resourceStream);
            return customProperties;
        } catch (IOException exception) {
            // Since the resource is bundled with the application,
            // we should never get here.
            throw new UncheckedIOException(
                    "custom.properties not properly packaged with application",
                    exception
            );
        }
    }
}

Saving Properties as XML

Storing Properties in a XML File

The way you store properties files as XML files is very similar to the way you would store them as .properties files. Just instead of using the store() you would use storeToXML().

public void saveProperties(String location) throws IOException{
	// make new instance of properties
	Properties prop = new Properties();
 
	// set the property values
	prop.setProperty("name", "Steve");
	prop.setProperty("color", "green");
	prop.setProperty("age", "23");
 
	// check to see if the file already exists
	File file = new File(location);
	if (!file.exists()){
		file.createNewFile();
	}
 
	// save the properties
	prop.storeToXML(new FileOutputStream(file), "testing properties with xml");
}

Loading Properties from a XML File

Now to load this file as a properties you need to call the loadFromXML() instead of the load() that you would use with regular .properties files.

public static void loadProperties(String location) throws FileNotFoundException, IOException{
	// make new properties instance to load the file into
	Properties prop = new Properties();
 
	// check to make sure the file exists
	File file = new File(location);
	if (file.exists()){
		// load the file
		prop.loadFromXML(new FileInputStream(file));
 
		// print out all the properties
		for (String name : prop.stringPropertyNames()){
			System.out.println(name + "=" + prop.getProperty(name));
		}
	} else {
		System.err.println("Error: No file found at: " + location);
	}
}

Saving Properties as XML

Property files caveat: trailing whitespace

Very rarely this is what users expect and one and can only speculate why this is the default behavior of Properties class. It is however easy to create an enhanced version of Properties that fixes this problem. The following class, TrimmedProperties, does just that. It is a drop-in replacement for standard Properties class.

import java.io.FileInputStream;
import java.io.FileReader;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.io.Reader;
import java.util.Map.Entry;
import java.util.Properties;
 
/**
 * CustomProperties class where values are trimmed for trailing whitespace if the
 * properties are loaded from a file.
 *
 * <p>
 * In the standard {@link java.util.Properties Properties} class, trailing
 * whitespace is always preserved. This class fixes this problem. Trimming of
 * trailing whitespace only takes place if the source of input is a file and only
 * where the input is line-oriented (meaning that for example loading from an XML
 * file is <i>not</i> changed by this class). This class is almost in all cases a
 * safe drop-in replacement for the standard <tt>Properties</tt> class.
 *
 * <p>
 * Whitespace is defined here as any of space (U+0020) or tab (U+0009).
 * *
 */
public class ModifiedProperties extends Properties {
 
    /**
     * Reads a property list (key and element pairs) from the input byte stream.
     *
     * <p>
     * Behaves exactly as {@link java.util.Properties#load(java.io.InputStream)} with
     * the exception that trailing whitespace is trimmed from property values if
     * <tt>inStream</tt> is an instance of <tt>FileInputStream</tt>.
     *
     * @see java.util.Properties#load(java.io.InputStream)
     * @param inStream the input stream.
     * @throws IOException if an error occurred when reading from the input stream.
     */
    @Override
    public void load(InputStream inStream) throws IOException {
        if (inStream instanceof FileInputStream) {
            // First read into temporary props using the standard way
            Properties tempProps = new Properties();
            tempProps.load(inStream);
            // Now trim and put into target
            trimAndLoad(tempProps);
        } else {
            super.load(inStream);
        }
    }
 
    /**
     * Reads a property list (key and element pairs) from the input character stream
     * in a simple line-oriented format.
     *
     * <p>
     * Behaves exactly as {@link java.util.Properties#load(java.io.Reader)} with the
     * exception that trailing whitespace is trimmed on property values if
     * <tt>reader</tt> is an instance of <tt>FileReader</tt>.
     *
     * @see java.util.Properties#load(java.io.Reader) }
     * @param reader the input character stream.
     * @throws IOException if an error occurred when reading from the input stream.
     */
    @Override
    public void load(Reader reader) throws IOException {
        if (reader instanceof FileReader) {
            // First read into temporary props using the standard way
            Properties tempProps = new Properties();
            tempProps.load(reader);
            // Now trim and put into target
            trimAndLoad(tempProps);
        } else {
            super.load(reader);
        }
    }
 
    private void trimAndLoad(Properties p) {
        for (Entry<Object, Object> entry : p.entrySet()) {
            if (entry.getValue() instanceof String) {
                put(entry.getKey(), trimTrailing((String) entry.getValue()));
            } else {
                put(entry.getKey(), entry.getValue());
            }
        }
    }
 
    /**
     * Trims trailing space or tabs from a string.
     *
     * @param str
     * @return
     */
    public static String trimTrailing(String str) {
        if (str != null) {
            // read str from tail until char is no longer whitespace
            for (int i = str.length() - 1; i >= 0; i--) {
                if ((str.charAt(i) != ' ') && (str.charAt(i) != '\t')) {
                    return str.substring(0, i + 1);
                }
            }
        }
        return str;
    }
}

Basic Programs